(Revised June 29, 2009)
(* In Part
2 I'll talk about how people can learn to become more sensitive to
this dimension of human experience.)

Psychotherapists,
group
leaders in management training, patients themselves, and people in
personal
growth programs all can benefit from learning about the nature and
impact
of nonverbal communications. This paper will review the major
categories
of this dimension of interpersonal behavior.

The major
categories
of nonverbal communications include the following (and will be
discussed
in greater detail further):

personal
space

eye contact

position

posture

paralanguage

expression

gesture

touch

locomotion

pacing

adornment

context

physiologic
responses

The
Significance
of Nonverbal Communications

Stated briefly, how
something
is expressed may carry more significance and weight than what is said,
the words themselves. Accompanied by a smile or a frown, said with a
loud,
scolding voice or a gentle, easy one, the contents of our
communications
are framed by our holistic perceptions of their context. Those sending
the messages may learn to understand themselves better as well as
learning
to exert some greater consciousness about their manner of speech. Those
receiving the messages may learn to better understand their own
intuitive
responses–sometimes in contrast to what it seems "reasonable" to think.

Part of our culture
involves
an unspoken rule that people should ignore these nonverbal elements– as
if the injunction were, "hear what I say, and don't notice the way I
say
it." These elements are often ignored in school or overridden by
parents,
so the task of incorporating conscious sensitivity to nonverbal
communications
is made more difficult.

Of course the early
therapists
attended to such cues, but little was written about ways to really
bring
such elements into sharper awareness until the work of pioneers such as
Reich, Moreno, and Perls. Even today many clinical training
programs
give short shrift to the task of really acquainting their students with
the nuances of this vital dimension. (I speculate that this is because
it is a very revealing study, and teachers need to feel remarkably
secure
in their own persona, that way they come across to others.)

Internal Cues

Nonverbal communication
occurs
not only between people, but also internally. People grimace, stand in
certain postures, and in other ways behave so as to reinforce to
themselves
certain positions, attitudes, and implicit beliefs. Unconsciously, they
suggest to themselves the role they choose to play, submissive or
dominant,
trusting or wary, controlled or spontaneous. Thus, a therapist can use
nonverbal behavior to diagnose intrapsychic as well as interpersonal
dynamics,
and individuals can be helped to become aware of their own bodily
reactions
as clues to their developing greater insight.

Learning
by Doing

People and especially,
people
who work with or help other people–managers, teachers, etc.--would do
well
to read about nonverbal communications. (It will also help to read Part
2, about how to use experiential exercises to actually get the feel
of a wide range of behaviors. This adds a deeper level of understanding
to mere intellectual knowledge.)

Categories
of
Nonverbal Communications

Personal Space:
This category refers to the distance which people feel comfortable
approaching
others or having others approach them. People from certain countries,
such
as parts of Latin America or the Middle East often feel comfortable
standing
closer to each other, while persons of Northern European descent tend
to
prefer a relatively greater distance. Different distances are also
intuitively
assigned for situations involving intimate relations, ordinary personal
relationships (e.g., friends), social relations (e.g., co-workers or
salespeople),
or in public places (e.g., in parks, restaurants, or on the street.
(Keltner,
1970).

Eye Contact:
This rich dimension speaks volumes. The Spanish woman in the Nineteenth
Century combined eye language with the aid of a fan to say what was not
permissible to express explicitly. Eye contact modifies the meaning of
other nonverbal behaviors. For example, people on elevators or crowds
can
adjust their sense of personal space if they agree to limit eye
contact.
What happens if this convention isn't followed? (Scheflen, 1972.) This
issue of eye contact is another important aspect of nonverbal
communication.

Modern American
business
culture values a fair degree of eye contact in interpersonal relations,
and looking away is sensed as avoidance or even deviousness. However,
some
cultures raise children to minimize eye contact, especially with
authority
figures, lest one be perceived as arrogant or "uppity." When cultures
interact,
this inhibition of gaze may be misinterpreted as "passive aggressive"
or
worse.

Position:
The
position one takes vis-a-vis the other(s), along with the previous two
categories of distance between people and angle of eye contact all are
subsumed under a more general category of "proxemics" in the writings
on
nonverbal communications (Scheflen, 1963).

Posture:
A
person's bodily stance communicates a rich variety of messages.
Consider
the following postures and the emotional effect they seem to suggest:

We should not underestimate the power of tone of voice. Another
semi-linguistic element is dialect, and this can also be subtle and
within the culture, suggesting class, age, sophistication, etc. How a
person uses the language---too snooty, too low-class?---or regional
dialect, all call up unconscious associations and possible prejudices.
There's also the problem of understand-ability, which applies not only
to people from other cultures or nations, but also
inter-generationally. Some television programs have their characters
speaking so rapidly and often softly that folks of an older generation
can hardly hear or keep up---even with the volume turned up.

Facial Expression:
The face is more highly developed as an organ of expression in humans
than
any other animal. Some of these become quite habitual, almost fixed
into
the chronic muscular structure of the face. For instance, in some parts
of the South, the regional pattern of holding the jaw tight creates a
slight
bulge in the temples due to an overgrowth or "hypertrophy" of those jaw
muscles that arise in that area. This creates a characteristic
appearance.
The squint of people who live a lot in the sun is another example. More
transient expressions often reveal feelings that a person is not
intending
to communicate or even aware of. Here are just a few to warm you up:

pensive

amused

sad

barely
tolerant

warning

pouting

anxious

sexually
attracted

startled

confused

sleepy

intoxicated

Gesture:
There
are many kinds of gestures:

clenching
fist

shaking a
finger

pointing

biting
fingernails

tugging at
hair

squirming

rubbing
chin

smoothing
hair

folding
arms

raising
eyebrows

pursing
lips

narrowing
eyes

scratching
head

looking
away

hands on
hips

hands
behind head

rubbing
nose

rocking

sticking
out tongue

tugging
earlobe

waving

These, too, have
many
different meanings in different cultures, and what may be friendly in
one
country or region can be an insult in another (Morris et al, 1979,
Maginnis,
1958).

Touch:
How
one person touches another communicates a great deal of information: Is
a grip gentle or firm, and does one hold the other person on the back
of
the upper arm, on the shoulder, or in the middle of the back. Is the
gesture
a push or a tug? Is the touch closer to a pat, a rub, or a grabbing?
People
have different areas of personal intimacy, and this refers not only to
the sexual dimension, but also the dimension of self control. Many
adolescents
are particularly sensitive to any touching that could be interpreted as
patronizing or undue familiarity. Even the angle of one's holding
another's
hand might suggest a hurrying or coercive implicit attitude, or on the
other hand, a respectful, gentle, permission-giving approach (Smith,
Clance
& Imes, 1998, Jones, 1994).

Locomotion:
The style of physical movement in space also communicates a great deal,
as well as affecting the feelings of the person doing the moving
(Morris,
1977):

slither

crawl

totter

walk

stroll

shuffle

hurry

run

jog

spring

tiptoe

march

jump

hop

skip

climb

swing

acrobatics

swim

slink

Pacing: This
is the way an action is done.

jerky

pressured

nervous

gradual

graceful

fatigued

tense

easy

shaky

deliberate

furtive

clumsy

A related variable is the time it takes to react to a stimulus, called
"latency of response." Some people seem to react to questions, interact
in conversations, or are slower or faster "on the uptake" than others.

Adornment:
Our communications are also affected by a variety of other variables,
such
as clothes, makeup, and accessories. These offer signals relating to
context
(e.g. formal vs. informal), status, and individuality. The ways people
carry cigarettes, pipes, canes, or relate to their belts, suspenders,
or
glasses also suggests different semiotic meanings. (Semiotics is the
science
of the emotional or psychological impact of signs, appearances–not
words–that's
"semantics"-- but of how things look.)Context: While this
category
is not actually a mode of nonverbal communication, the setting up of a
room or how one places oneself in that room is a powerfully suggestive
action. Where one sits in the group is often useful in diagnosing that
person's attitude toward the situation. Group leaders or psychodrama
directors
need to be especially alert to the way the group room is organized.
Consider
the following variables and imagine how they might affect the
interaction: - amount and source
of light - color of the
lighting - obvious props, a
podium, blackboard - the size of the
room - colors of the
walls,
floor, furniture - seating
arrangements - number of people
present - environmental
sounds,
smells, and temperature - the numbers and
ratios of high-status and low status people - the positioning
of the various people in the space,
who sits next to whom, who sits apart, who sits close, etc.

Physiological
Responses:
This, too, is an exceptional category, because it cannot be practiced
voluntarily.
Still, it's useful for therapists and group members to become more
aware
of these subtle signs of emotion. It often helps to comment on these
observations,
as it implicitly gives permission to the person experiencing the
emotion
to more fully open to that feeling; or, sometimes, to more actively
suppress
it. Either way, the existence of that signal is made explicit in the
group
process. Some of the clues to physiological processes include:

shaking

flaring of
nostrils

trembling
chin

sweating

blanching

cold
clammy skin

blushing

moisture
in eyes

flushing

blinking

swallowing

breathing
heavily

While a few of
these
behaviors can be mimicked, for the most part these reactions happen
involuntarily.
The only exercise is to watch for these reactions in oneself or others,
at least mentally note their occurrence, and consider what the meaning
of that emotional reaction might be.

Modifying
Communication
Patterns

It's important to
realize
that these are just habits, culturally and personally learned behaviors
that can be un-learned and new ones learned in their stead. Role
playing
or psychodrama can be an adjunct to this kind of re-education, in a
process
of personal development for people who are essentially pretty healthy,
as well as part of psychotherapy. Assertion training for the timid and
anger management for the more explosive are two sets of re-training
programs
that could make great use of attention given to nonverbal styles of
self-expression,
internal cueing, and communications.

This role training may
be
a source of insight as well as merely behavioral re-conditioning. The
enactments
of nonverbal behaviors may be associated with scenes in which these
behaviors
occur and where there were first learned. Such enactments can help
people
connect their behaviors with underlying attitudes, such as expectations
of others, fantasies that criticism will be catastrophically
destructive,
or a forlorn hope of magical rescue. And then re-playing these scenes
with
various alternative elements may help re-align those underlying
attitudes.

Summary

People react to the
unspoken,
as much (if not more) to how something is said as to what are the
explicit
meaning of the words. Misunderstandings can often be clarified if the
people
involved have the ability to notice and comment on the nonverbal
communications
in an interaction. People will benefit from learning the range of
nonverbal
behaviors in order to clarify the often subtle dynamics of the
situations
they find themselves in. For example, in a marriage, sometimes the
other
person gets irritated by some mysterious event: Exploring what was the
problem may lead to an awareness that the way something was said
communicated
an unintended meaning! By making the nonverbal communication more
clear, misunderstandings can be resolved.

The field of nonverbal
communications
has grown rapidly over the last few decades, and it has applications in
business, media, international relations, education, and indeed any
field
which significantly involves interpersonal and group dynamics.
Certainly
there is a need for more psychological mindedness in all these realms.